


some days that happen to you

by whytho



Category: Paranatural (Webcomic)
Genre: Gen, Kinda, Movie AU, Pre-Relationship, bad movie au, by which i mean both the au and the movie in the au are bad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-18
Updated: 2016-03-18
Packaged: 2018-05-27 10:13:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6280492
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whytho/pseuds/whytho
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Contrary to popular belief, there is a method to Rick’s madness. </p><p>(Zarei thinks otherwise.)</p><p>(Garcia probably doesn’t know him well enough to judge, really.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	some days that happen to you

Rick’s papers were getting sticky.

It was lunchtime on a Wednesday, and, like he did on most Wednesdays, Rick brought orange chicken and rice. Unfortunately, today was the day his rice decided to spill all over his papers, covering them in glops of damp rice and orange spots. 

Richard dragged a rice-covered hand over his face and sighed. Mr. Starchman, next to him, continued to discuss the art classes with air, not even noticing Spender’s predicament. Rick sighed harder and pinched the bridge of his nose.

His despair- and Starchman’s rant- were cut short by a knock on the door frame. Spender looked up and found an angry ginger boy at the door, along with a tall, scary girl holding a mug of something. 

Spender sighed. “Yes?” he asked, trying hide his wince.

The ginger boy stared at him, agape, then shook himself out of it. “Sorry. I- um, you’ve sorta got rice. All over your face. Just- just so you know.”

Rick scrambled for a napkin, trying to hide his eyes from the children. When he finally finished brushing off his face, he looked back up at the two of them and put realized who they were. “Ah. You’re… Isaac, right? From World Studies?”

Isaac nodded. “And this is-”

“Lisa,” the girl interrupted in a smooth, heavy voice. Her calm, all knowing expression was almost eerie, one you wouldn’t expect to see on a college student. She took a sip of her drink- coffee, from the smell- smiled creepily, and said, “We need your help.”

Spender was taken aback. “My help? With what, your history homework?”

Isaac hesitated. “No. The- the two of us are in a film class together, and we’re doing an extra credit project together to make sure we pass, along with about fifteen other people.”

“...So?” Spender prompted. 

Uncomfortable, Isaac cleared his throat. “We, uh… we need a teacher. One that can just, you know, be there on set to make sure we don’t mess up.”

“...So you think I should do that?” Spender asked, bewildered. 

“Well, we had a teacher that agreed to let us use his classroom, but he’s not very… hmm, steady.” Lisa said. “We need someone that can stay awake the entire time.”

Spender knit his eyebrows at them. “There are lots of professors here that can do that.”

Isaac pursed his lips, ever the struggling genius. “Yes, but all of them have significant others, or busy social lives. We need someone that doesn’t go to poetry slams every Tuesday and Thursday.” He nodded at Mr. Starchman, performing soliloquies to his baby carrots. “And we especially need one that doesn’t sleep through class every single day.” His lips pressed into a thin, barely visible line. 

Spender shuffled his papers around for a few minutes, thinking about it. Was he willing to give up copious amounts of his time to watch over some kids trying to act? Maybe. They were right; he didn’t have much of a social life. “Fine,” he relented. “I’ll think about it.”

~~~~~

He was still thinking about it two days later when he met Mina Zarei for coffee. It was their ritual: bring all the tests and homeworks that needed to be graded to the cafe outside the courtyard, mix several espressos with hot chocolate, and moan at each other about their lives. 

It was chilly outside, he thought, walking to meet Zarei. The walk to their cafe needed a jacket, even in the half fading light. The trees few remaining leaves were falling now, though. Maybe it was a sign that winter was coming. 

Mina was wearing a jacket, pretty and sleek. Yes, it was definitely a sign, Spender decided. He needed a new coat. 

Zarei raised an eyebrow at him. “Lost in the clouds, Richard?”

Rick smiled and pulled himself down to Earth. “Always, my dear doctor.” Gallantly, he offered her his arm, but as usual, she refused.

At their shop, seated at their normal seats, with a flood of papers surrounding them, Doctor Zarei raised an eyebrow again. “Richard, are you sure you’re not floating away? You seem to be sighing quite a bit today.”

Rick sighed, then glared at Mina when she smirked at him. “I’m fine. I just- these kids wanted me to help them with a movie or something, and I…”

“The student short film?” she asked knowledgeably. When Spender gave her a look, she defended, “What? They asked me to act in it.” 

“Why couldn’t you be the adviser?” Spender grumbled. Of course he knew why: doctors with too much free time and a love for volunteering at schools with medical programs weren’t technically teachers, even if they had doctorates. “And anyway, what did you say?”

“...I said yes,” Zarei admitted, holding her chin up a little. “The… That one TA had agreed to help, and I thought that…”

Now it was Spender raising his eyebrows. “That you could start talking?”

“That the project might need some other teachers,” she replied. “What’s it to you? Planning on doing it?”

Spender sighed, resting his head on his rice-covered papers. “I… don’t know. Maybe.”

“Try it, Richard,” Doctor Zarei told him, wise yet teasing. “After all, you need a hobby.”

~~~~~

“Ready, and… ACTION!”

“Isaac, that’s my job,” Lisa told him as Spender clapped his hands over his ears. 

Isaac huffed. RJ the camera person patted him on the back. 

“Alright,” Lisa called. “Action!”

Rick wasn’t sure how to handle this many children. Ahead of him, there were eight actors being filmed, with only one adult among them. Behind the camera there were several more kids, along with the lighting crew, set designers, and one guy with three boxes of donuts- Spender wasn’t sure why that kid was there. All in all, though, there were probably three adults on set. 

On top of that, Spender kept tripping over wires running across the floor and falling into haphazardly stacked desks. The set, despite being a normal classroom half an hour earlier, had turned into a disaster. Spender tried to sit on a chair not ten minutes earlier and it collapsed because it wasn’t a real chair. 

Now he was hiding inside to a pile of desks. 

Snores echoed out from across the room. One of the actors flinched and Isaac, without hesitating, jumped up and yelled, “CUT!”

“Isaac,” Lisa reminded him. “This is all my job.”

“Oh. Oh, yeah. Sorry.” He sat back down and Lisa repeated, “Cut.”

The snorer sat up. It was a scruffy man, bearded and tall. Spender had seen him around campus a few times, but never realized he was a teacher. After all, a lot of the students preferred the ‘haven’t shaved in a week and can’t remember my last meal’ look, although Spender didn’t understand why. 

“Oh,” the scruffy man murmured. “Sorry, did I... interrupt you guys?”

Isaac harrumphed. Level, Lisa told the man, “Yes, you rather did. Mr. Garcia, could you maybe do your napping a little quieter?”

Garcia nodded. The scene continued. 

~~~~~

Rick ended up staring at Garcia, most days. There were no other adults in the room, he was bored, and Garcia was always napping. It was inevitable. 

When Doctor Zarei noticed, she just sipped her drink and smiled. 

“Hey,” Richard protested half-heartedly. “You can’t do that.”

“Do what, exactly?” Zarei prompted, raising her eyebrows mockingly.

“The… the thing.”

“Hmm. Maybe.”

When Rick watched Mr. Garcia stumble across a room to get a water bottle, he could feel Mina's eyes on the back of his neck. He exhaled, eyes closed, then gave up. “Hey,” he called out, loud enough to be heard but quiet enough for a person to ignore him. “I have a pile of desks that you could, ah, come sleep in, if… if you’re that tired.”

Garcia considered it for half a second, then nodded and staggered across the room to reach Rick. He collapsed on the floor before he quite got there, but Richard pulled him the rest of the way into the desk-cave. 

“Hmm… thank you,” Garcia muttered sleepily. 

“Ah, it’s- it’s quite alright,” Rick replied.

He looked down at the man, lying on the ground covered in chalk dust, and was about to could feel the words forming on his lips when Garcia said, quite easily, “I have a narcolepsy, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

“Oh,” Rick said. 

“Yes. Ah, yes. Can I use your leg to sleep? It wouldn’t be for long.”

Without waiting for an answer, Garcia pulled on of Spender’s legs closer to him and used his calf as a pillow. Rick tried not to regret every one of the life choices that lead up this moment, and instead focused on the soothing sound of Cody Jones over-emoting. It was almost peaceful, if you ignored the fact that his co-star sounded so dry and unmotivated it infected the room with sadness. 

The floor was cold and dusty, he thought suddenly. Rick disliked it, just a little. Even the smell, old and chilly, felt unforgiving. Classrooms had such dark atmospheres sometimes. 

While Cody was finishing his speech, the donut boy poked his head under the mound of desk. “Mr. Spender, sir?” he asked. “You can probably come out now.” 

Spender gestured to Garcia. “Ah,” the boy said. 

Edward Burger, Spender suddenly recalled. His name was Edward Burger. He went to the Life Science club for three years and never once kept a fake baby alive for longer than a week. Ed scratched his head for a second, then crawled into the dark space and offered Spender a donut. 

“For the record,” Ed said quietly, “I could probably help you pry him off your leg.”

Rick sighed. “I know, Edward. I know.”

Lisa, too, appeared in Spender’s line of sight. She leaned down, surveying the scene, and told Spender, “We could all get him off of you, if you'd like.” An army of college kids materialized behind her and slowly began to creep into the chair den. 

Rick sighed yet again, feeling old beyond his years. “We can wait a little, Lisa.”

He looked down at Garcia, curled around his leg in the shape of a question mark, guarded even in sleep. His dark hair was ruffled in an easy, mindless way, and Rick watched as he began to stir. Lisa and her cronies moved in closer, staring like lions watching their prey. That was the first time Rick Spender saw Mr. Garcia, sleeping extraordinaire, wake up in a dark cave, surrounded by blood-thirsty caffeine fueled maniacs sitting calmly around him, clutching onto Rick’s legs as Isaac sniffed haughtily somewhere above them all. Rick hoped it would be the last time he ever saw such a thing. 

~~~~~

It was.

Garcia never talked about his nap. They saw each other in the classroom, of course, on the days Lisa wanted to film there, but Garcia always found a way to sneak out or grade papers or nap on a bench far away from Spender. 

“You shouldn't take it personally,” Mina had said one day, eyeing Garcia out of the corner of her eyes. The edges of her glasses had gotten rhinestones at some point. Spender half considered making a comment about them, but decided against it. 

“Why not?” Spender had asked. It was very tempting to say something; the rhinestones were right there in front of him, along with the bubbly TA they were trying to impress. 

“Because, Richard, I can barely talk to you easily when we just have a conversation, let alone after I’ve attached myself to your leg and started napping,” Doctor Zarei had told him. 

Spender had smiled a little, he couldn't help it. “Hmm, there was that one time in sixth grade…” 

Zarei had ignored him.

Now it was one of Zarei's acting days, though, and Rick was left alone to stew in the corner. He tried to pay attention to Cody, who was simultaneously over-emoting and remaining deadpan, but got distracted by all the wires. Then he watched Jeff, directing the lights this way and that like he was a pro, but all the movement made his eyes hurt. 

So instead Rick watched RJ. 

Richard hadn’t ever spoken to the camera person- not even once. As far as he knew, they weren’t even aware of his existence. The only people they did talk to were Ed, Lisa, and Marcus, the other camera guy. Still, RJ was good at what they did. Spender had seen a couple of their shots once, and they had made Maxwell Puckett, professional glarer, look like a god. 

As Rick watched, Mr. Garcia rose up from his position on the bench to talk to RJ. He was hesitant, and awkward, but from across the room Spender could tell that RJ thought the world of him. Their eyes were alight and they nodded along to Garcia’s every word. 

“Cut,” Lisa called, looking half asleep. “Sarah, can I talk to you outside? I wanna think about the scripts. Isaac, you come too.”

They left, and in the silence, Richard heard the murmured remains of the conversation across the room. 

“So, y’see, if you just adjust the lighting in order to change the refraction,” Garcia said, sounding far more awake and nervous than Rick had ever heard him, “-and Jeff could probably help you with that- then you’d get the clarity. See?”

RJ beamed up at him, stars in their eyes. “Ah, yes. But the, uh, the glare…”

Garcia opened his mouth, then caught himself and almost, almost smiled. Rick, thinking over it, hadn’t seen him smile once as he watched him from across the classroom. “No, because the popcorn effect would… see?”

RJ’s stars grew brighter. “How… how’d you figure this all out?”

“Um,” was Mr. Garcia’s eloquent response. “Well, it’s all just science.”

Watching them, Rick came close to smiling. Mina caught his eye from the set as he turned away and Spender could tell she was going to raise her eyebrows. He looked away before she could. He was so busy looking away that he didn’t notice the large warm mass settle next to him on the bench until Mr. Garcia did. 

“Oh.”

“Hmm, yeah,” Garcia replied nervously. 

“...How was RJ?” Rick asked helplessly. 

“Oh,” Garcia echoed. “They… certainly knew cameras.”

A gap filled the space between them. “And you… do know cameras?” Richard found himself asking. 

“...I know science,” Garcia replied. 

“Oh.”

Garcia sighed then, air gushing out and filling the silence till it overflowed. He leaned back against the wall, and Rick felt like the sigh teetering over the edges of their conversation was the only thing keeping him in place. Spender sighed, too- it was the only way to keep the wordless conversation going. It sounded far older and breathier than Garcia’s, like the wind whistling through the branches of an ancient tree. 

The door slammed open. Isaac, sporting a glare, stomped into the room. Lisa, equally angry but hiding it well, followed him. The room immediately turned cold with their presence. Their sighs blew over the edges of their silence to fill the one in the rest of the room. 

“Well,” Isaac said, looking strangely at loss for words. “I think… I think I’m going to go research something for this scene. I’ll… I’ll be at the library if you need me.” And with that, he left, with as much gusto as when he entered. 

Max, sitting on the sidelines, hardened his expression and stood. “I’ll join him. Uh, Mr. Spender, would you like to come?”

Spender bit his lip. He could feel Garcia’s eyes on him, asking a question he didn’t know the answer to. “I… I can come.”

Max nodded at him, as cold as a rock, and walked out. Spender followed him. 

They walked down the hallway in silence. Rick hadn’t noticed how loud he was; every footstep was like a brick falling on the linoleum. Max, on the other hand, walked like a ghost. Maybe he was, Rick mused. It would certainly explain why Max was always so quiet and solemn. 

Max didn’t say anything, but Spender could hear his breath, loud in the quiet corridor. Rick made the first move. “So, ah, research. What do we have to look up?”

Max slowed. “He… Isaac just thinks that everything needs to be perfect. So he probably wants us to make sure all the Latin in there is correct, or something.” 

Spender tried to find a hidden meaning in his words. As far as he could tell, Latin was not a codeword for something. “So… we should just… find a Latin book?”

Max nodded, his shoulders set. 

When they got to the library, though, a Latin book was not to be found. Instead, all there was, all that was filling the room, was Isaac. He sat on a chair in the center of the room, curled up and small and fragile, and it was odd to think that a boy so small could fill up the room with sadness. 

“...Isaac?” Rick asked. There was nothing else to say. 

Isaac sighed, a small, quiet noise that made no effect on the universe. It had an effect on the room Rick was in, though, and the library suddenly seemed a whole lot… sadder. Emptier. Rick wanted to sigh along, to cancel out Isaac’s tiny noise of melancholy, but couldn’t. It would have been too… noisy. 

‘I’m… I’m right here,” Isaac replied. Even Max didn’t seem to have the heart to tell him he was pointing out the obvious. 

Hesitantly, Rick crossed to stand in front of Isaac, Max at his heels. Up close, Isaac looked out of place and almost twisted, limbs and shoulders and hips turned at funny angles. Spender licked his lips, nervous, then gently place his hand on Isaac’s shoulder. The muscles under his hand felt like how they looked: twisted and pained and uncomfortable, out of place in a dusty library.

Rick could sigh now, and he did. 

Quietly, Isaac whispered, “Max? Did I- Did I…”

In a flash, Max was kneeling next to him, his breath calm and steady in the quiet room. It seemed to settle everything, to slow the dust and steady Isaac’s fractured inhales. 

Jaw tight, Max said, “Trust me, Isaac. It’s all good. Everything’s good.”

Isaac curled further in on himself. “But… was my writing… was it..?”

Max attempted a smile, though it ended up more like a grimace. “When I said it was all good, Isaac, I mean everything was good. All of it. The entirety of this scenario.”

“Wow, Max,” was Isaac’s response, sounding a little less clenched and tight. “With words like those, maybe you should try writing.” He laughed, shaky and self-deprecating. 

Max tensed again, laying a soft hand on the top of Isaac’s head. Spender watched the two of them, soft and closed and warm together, and quietly backed out of the room. A few minutes later, Max joined him, slipping around the door to lean against the wall. 

“Ah,” Spender said, partially to him. “Is he…” 

“He’s, uh, pulling himself back together,” Max said, glancing away from Spender. “So he kicked me out.”

Rick didn’t know what to say after that. He swallowed, feeling out of place, and tried, “So, uh, are you two..?”

Max turned back to Spender, eyes wide. “What? No, we… I definitely don’t want that. At all.”

“Oh.” Spender was very confused. “It was just- just very-”

Max shook his head. “No. I do not want anything like that, with anyone.”

Spender said, faintly, “Oh.” Then he faced the wall and tried not to think. 

Isaac came out of the room with a bang, just like how he’d entered the set not half an hour ago. His shoulders were set, looking strong and unbreakable, and there were no traces of the last Isaac Rick had seen. 

“I… the Latin was correct,” Isaac said, pressing his lips together. He started walking, not waiting to see if Spender or Max would follow. They did, exchanging looks before tailing after him. 

Back in the classroom, Garcia was silent. He didn’t say anything when Spender sunk down next to him, nor when Lisa started the scene over. The only thing he did react to was RJ’s camera techniques- and even then he just nodded, approving. 

In the silence, Spender didn’t notice Lisa ambling over towards him. “Mr. Spender,” she said, voice as smooth and dulcet as always, “Thank you for helping with Isaac just now.”

“It’s fine,” Spender told her. “It was mostly Max, anyway.”

“Still.” Then she wiggled her eyebrows in Garcia’s direction, looking strangely like Doctor Zarei. As Lisa wandered back to the scene, Rick tried not to shudder. 

Zarei, currently on camera, looked like she would never do something as lewd as wiggling her eyebrows. Next to Day, the TA, she was even smiling. Rick tried to remember ever seeing her like that. He couldn’t, not really, because Zarei only ever smiled when she was making a bad pun. Even then, her smile was grim, like she couldn’t believe what she was doing. 

“What are they doing?” Garcia asked, quiet and tired and bewildered. 

Rick looked over at him. “Oh, they’re… flirting. I think.”

Garcia asked, “...Flirting?” as if he didn’t understand the meaning of the word. 

Rick looked at him, looked hard. Garcia was tired, that was for sure, but Spender didn’t think he was so exhausted he couldn’t tell what flirting was. Garcia flicked his eyes back at Spender, pressing his lips together, his irises deep and dark against his cheekbones. 

Spender swallowed. “Yeah,” he said. “Yes, they’re flirting.”

“Oh,” Garcia said finally. “Well.” 

He leaned back against the wall, wincing at its chill, and closed his eyes. He looked exhausted. Spender studied his profile: his lashes as dark as his eyes, and his eyebrows even darker. In the dim lighting, Garcia looked like a mystery, like a puzzle that could never be solved, like a police case that had been cold for fifty years. Rick had read somewhere that someone had once created an impossible box, one that could never open. Garcia looked just like that. 

“Oh,” Garcia said again, in a tone that sounded like he’d just cracked the impossible box. “They’re flirting.”

Spender’s smile slipped out after that; keeping it in would have been a feat worthy of Hercules. “Yeah. They’re flirting.”

Rick rests his head against the brick, mirroring Garcia. He feels strangely alight, like the music from Jeff’s stereo is pulling out bits and pieces of his soul. It’s a good feeling, he supposes. He leaves a sigh hanging out in the open, for what feels like the hundredth time today, but this one is warm and contented, like music and warm water and dancing. Garcia’s sounds exactly the same, and for once, Richard is content. 

~~~~~ 

“So,” Zarei said, leaning over the rim of her coffee mug like she knew a secret. 

“So,” Spender repeated dully. He leafed through his papers, trying to find a copy _Leaves of Grass_ , as Zarei stared at him. 

Zarei is quiet for a moment, watching him search frantically. Then, “Are you sure you don’t have the hots for Garcia?”

“Mina.” Rick pressed his lips together. Zarei frowned at the use of her first name, like a petulant child, but it was reflex. “Sorry,” he amended. “I just- really, are you sure you’re not projecting your own desires onto my life?”

“Maybe,” she replied, taking a sip of her drink. She stared out the window, lost in thought. Outside, leaves tumbled through the streets in waves, and Spender tried not to shiver. He really needed a jacket. 

~~~~~

They finish the film far too quickly. Admittedly, Spender hadn’t been paying attention to any of the filming, but wouldn’t it take more than three weeks to film and edit a short film?

According to Jeff, resident film expert, two weeks was nothing. “I heard this one story,” he’d told Spender, hair wagging excitedly like he was an enormous dog, “about some film majors a couple of years ago. Two days before their project was due, they realized that not only had to finish editing twenty minutes worth of their project, they had to create an entire soundtrack for the thing, and then they just took shots of espresso and _did the whole thing_.”

Spender had zoned out after Jeff started quoting Ludovico Einaudi, but he got the gist. Three weeks was nothing in the world of film. 

“So,” Garcia said, joining Spender in the hallway outside his classroom as he waited for the cast to join them. “The final showing.”

Rick blinked. “Yes. Are you… coming?”

“Of course,” Garcia replied, like it was obvious. “They monopolized my classroom for two weeks; I get to see their movie. A fair trade.”

Rick blinked again, unsure if Garcia’s being sarcastic. It’s hard to tell. 

Cody turned the hallway corner, Jeff at his side. Alight, he bounded up to the two of them, and started talking about something. Jeff cut in, too, creating a bubbling mess of confusion and laughter that only got stronger when others arrived. Max leaned next to Garcia, watching the other students and looking about thirty. Isaac stood next to him and pouted. 

“So,” Lisa drawled, appearing out of nowhere. “Are we going or something?”

Max scowled and muttered, “She can’t talk, she’s late,” under his breath. Mr. Spender stopped himself from laughing. Judging by the way Garcia’s eyes crinkled up, he had to do the same.

The walk to the media building was short. All walks on this campus were short, really; Mayview University was tiny. The building, a tall, gray affair of steel on marble, looked far more clinical than Spender expected. Movies, he supposed, were meant to invoke emotion, so it made little sense that their birthplace would be so flat and boring. 

Then Rick thought about Garcia’s classroom, and its smell of dust and history, and the laughter that filled every corner of it, and realized that this bleak structure was not the birthplace of his students’ film. 

Sarah and RJ leapt up the stairs and everyone else followed. The room they were filming in was a big one, big enough to fit twenty or so people, but it would be cramped. Spender claimed his spot on the wall and watched everyone else clamor for a chair. 

Zarei slipped into the room at the last minute and joined him on the wall. “Did I miss anything?” she asked, looking harried. 

“...No,” Spender replied, eyeing Day, the TA. “Apart from Maxwell confessing his hidden love for the arts. And Sarah started dancing on a table, but, you know, nothing important.”

“You don’t need to be sarcastic,” Zarei said, side-eyeing him, but her mouth was twitching. 

They quieted as the teacher walked before the class, talking something incomprehensible about actors no one actually understood. She was quickly replaced by Lisa, who stared up at the crowd like she was planning their demises. 

“Well,” Lisa said, voice like treacle. “This has been fun, guys. Thanks to Isaac for writing the thing, and to the actors for acting. Mr. Spender and Mr. Garcia, despite doing nothing, were lovely additions to the set, so we’re all grateful for that. And hopefully everyone else did work good enough for extra credit. Anything else?”

No one spoke up, so Lisa started the film. 

It started with Cody’s voice, heavy and dramatic over the shots of rainy university buildings. _When I was twelve,_ Cody’s voice said, _I decide I was never going to stop breathing._ His voice cuts out for a second, replaced by some remorseful instrumentals, until: _I was wrong._

It is, without a doubt, one of the corniest things Rick has ever seen. All of Max’s lines are in a dead monotone, while Cody is delivering his like a twelve year old in his first school play. Spender’s almost certain Doctor Zarei isn’t even acting. RJ’s camera shots are excellent, but even they can’t make up for bad equipment. 

Rick, without a doubt, loves it. 

Dinner, later, is a rowdy affair. Garcia herded all of them to the only restaurant nearby, a Chinese place, and seemed to expect them to sit still. They didn’t.

Zarei sighed and leaned back on her chair. “Why on Earth,” she said, staring at the ceiling, “Would we think it was a good idea to bring nineteen college students anywhere at the same time?”

Garcia sipped his beer and pondered the same question. “I think we were drunk,” he said eventually, then finished his drink. Zarei laughed, surprisingly high-pitched. 

“At least they’re not.” She waved a hand in the students’ general direction. 

“Actually, Isaac’s had three shots so far.” Day spoke up. Spender snapped his head around to look at her, wondering how she saw everything. 

“It’s legal, sir,” Max called out from the other side of the room. “He’s twenty-one, meaning he can theoretically buy all of us alcohol.” Behind him, the other kids cheered.

Spender sighed and got to his feet. “That’s it, I’m taking you guys home,” he said to the adults, attempting to pull Zarei to her feet. “Doctor, you’re on call tomorrow, you can’t be doing this.”

A small hand touched his elbow, and he looked down to see Day helping him. “I can take her home,” she told him, “Besides, I’m heading in the same direction.”

“Ah. Well, thank you.” Rick scratched the back of his head, suddenly embarrassed, and looked down at Garcia. Toeing him, he said, “I guess I’ll just… get him home.”

At the bar, Max volunteered, “Or you could just drop him in a river somewhere.” Spender ignored him and leaned down. 

Garcia made a small, protesting noise and opened his eyes. “...You have rice on your face,” he mumbled. Spender didn’t particularly care, but made an effort to scrub it off. It was sticky against his palms, but didn’t leave a trace of its presence.

Outside, the rain was falling light and cold. Rick winced, and Garcia wordlessly tossed him his jacket. He caught it, with a bit of shock. Garcia's jacket was old and leather, and smelled like the inside of his classroom. Rick wondered, carelessly, if the smell there had come from him. Almost blushing, Garcia muttered, "You can keep that. I- I have extras."

Rick inhales once, hesitating, then nodded. Slow and quiet, he walked down the street with a possibly drunk Garcia, Garcia's tattered old jacket, and a copy of the worst movie ever, and Spender felt content.

**Author's Note:**

> bleh. i am bleh. (but also this is super long for me). and yes!!!!!!! aro max!!!! should be more of a thing!!!!!!!! ahhhh!! talk to me about aro max
> 
> also, for the record, this is mostly just me wanting spender to have lots and lots of friends and not me wanting spender to have a s/o. (tho apparently he's not single??) also it's because of that one unfinished fic by glowstickia about garcia and him that made me think their relationship was a maybe. 
> 
> (you know what would be excellent? that fic being updated. what a good fic. please also talk to me about how much you love everything glowstickia has ever written, ever)


End file.
